Two installations with multiple sites each and same webroot

[jannisborgers]

Hi there,

a multi-site installation that was built a couple of years back currently has four sites:

• deutsch.example.com/2020 (German 2020)
• english.example.com/2020 (English 2020)
• deutsch.example.com/2021 (German 2021)
• english.example.com/2021 (English 2021)

This was solved with a multi-site setup and a custom module, because the root domain should always point to the latest year-segment (deutsch.example.com currently redirects to deutsch.example.com/2021 etc.).

The second year’s content structure has already diverged noticeably (because editorial exceptions), so we want to put the upcoming year (2022) in a separate installation on the server. Because of the domain setup, we only have two webroots (one per language).

We need two new site URLs, this time pointing to the new installation:

• deutsch.example.com/2022 (German 2022)
• english.example.com/2022 (English 2022)

Possible solution

I found this thread, which helped me identify that Option 2 described by Brandon might work in our case:
https://craftcms.stackexchange.com/questions/37296/multiple-instances-of-craft-in-same-hosting-account-root

I set it up locally and now have three working directories:

• web, which holds the contents of the old web subfolder and which both local domains point to
• old with the old installation (sans web folder)
• new with a new installation (sans web folder)

I then modified the index.php inside web as follows:

…

// Set path constants
$uri = $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'];
$uri_path = parse_url($uri, PHP_URL_PATH);
$uri_segments = explode('/', $uri_path);
$site_folder = ($uri_segments[1] == "2022" || strpos($uri, "new-admin") !== false) ? 'new' : 'old';
define('CRAFT_BASE_PATH', dirname(__DIR__) . "/" . $site_folder);
define('CRAFT_VENDOR_PATH', CRAFT_BASE_PATH . '/vendor');

…

I also set up a new database and fed its details into the new installation’s .env file.

Questions

1. How can I access each installation’s control panel individually?
   • Currently when I visit domain.test/admin locally, I get a weird mix where I land in the old installation (with the four old sites), but the system name in the top left is taken from the new installation’s .env (my bad, had the .env settings backwards)
   • I have tried setting different cpTrigger settings in each installation’s general.php -> old-admin and new-admin respectively. I can now access domain.test/old-admin and get the old control panel, but domain.test/new-admin gives me an Template not found: new-admin error.
2. File uploads are now in one location for both installations. Can this be a problem when uploading files or modifying uploaded files from any of the two installations?
3. … anything else I should consider? I already found this knowledge base article, which I will follow as well, and of course this means a new license for the new installation.

Update 1

I have updated question 1 with corrected information and tried setting different cpTrigger values.

Update 2

Slowly getting there… and documenting for others to find.

• /new-admin URLs where referencing the old craft base path and thus throwing Template not found errors. To make sure that the old installation was responsible for these URLs, I had to make sure that URLs with that segment are correctly routed to the right CRAFT_BASE_PATH in index.php. Otherwise the old installation is used via the CRAFT_BASE_PATH, where new-admin is not the right cpTrigger.
• I also defined the @web and @webroot aliases specifically in both installations.

[brandonkelly]

Sounds like you’ve mostly got a handle on this.

File uploads are now in one location for both installations. Can this be a problem when uploading files or modifying uploaded files from any of the two installations?

I would not recommend sharing the same upload folder between two installations. Otherwise, if you make any changes to a file’s location in one install (rename it or move it), it will simply go missing in the other install. And if you edit or replace the file, its new dateModified and dimension data will be out of sync.

[jannisborgers]

Thanks @brandonkelly. I can confirm that the approach works right now, I have moved it to the client server as well, without problems.

I'll set up new upload locations for the new installations, that was the last item on my list.